Am I crazy?

[SC RN]

So I've just finished up two days of 12 hour shifts on PostPartum as a Nurse Tech. Three days of training and I was ready ... and it was amazing and exhausting and gratifying and frustrating and wonderful!

My question is ... I start my ADN program in August and want to work L&D or PP or MBU ... but all of the nurses who work at my hospital are already trying to talk me out of it! They say "why do you want to become a nurse" or "why do you want to work on the maternity floor ... why not a real floor like med surg" or "are you crazy"? So I'm starting to wonder ... am I?

Because I loved the feeling of being on the floor and helping patients .. yeah, the paperwork sucks, but it's necesary. I loved bathing new babies and seeing the look of awe on the father's face. I love bringing a new baby to mom and seeing the look of love on her face. I love answering breastfeeding questions ... seeing a baby latch on well for the first time and the relief on the moms face. I love all of this. I know there will be bad days.

So why the negativity from the nurses? Isn't it all worth it in the end? I'm leaving a job where I make $45k a year to go into nursing for less money. Because it's where I WANT TO BE!

Thanks for letting me vent .... back to daydreaming about beautiful babies and moms. :)

[Dayray, RN]

Nursing is so dynamic you either love it or hate it ...only time will tell. Burnt out nurses dont bother me nearly as much as the fact that they stay in areas they don't like.

As far as Maternal child not being a "real area" nothing could be further from the truth. It takes nerves of steal to stand kne high in blood with 2 patients (mother and baby) lives hanging in the balance.

I worked the ambulance, ER and a littel in ICU "the real areas" I've been in countless feild codes and pealed people off the pavent, before coming to L&D and I can tell you nothing has been as challanging as L&D yes we useually have good outcomes but it doesnt happen on its own. Potiential crisis is avoided by good nursing judgment on a daily basis. If you truly want to experance the a full range of emotion and to go home felling like you really made a differance don't let them talk you out of working maternal child. When they tell you its not a real area just tell them "yeah all I do is wash babys and teach breast feeding" when you get your OB rotaion in ADN school they will se what you really do and then they will wonder how you deal with it all.

GL in nursing and look at how many Maternal child nurses you have here that love their jobs =)